patrick.net

A school principal in Tennessee is suing his school district and its superintendent for suspending him after he taught kids about Big Tech censorship. The lawsuit claims his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights were violated.

We obtained a copy of the lawsuit for you here.

Following the events of January 6, the Shelby County Schools superintendent Joris Ray told principals to discuss the Capitol riot as a “teachable moment.” Cordova High School’s Principal Barton Thorne did exactly what the superintendent said.

In a virtual classroom, Thorne talked to students about the threat of Big Tech censorship in the aftermath of the riot. The riot at the US Capitol was used as a justification for Facebook, Twitter and more to censor President Trump and other conservatives.

Thorne accused these platforms of deciding who gets to speak and what message or ideology to amplify.

“I’m not going to tell you what to think, I just want to help you think,” Principal Thorne told his students in a online class a few days after the Capitol Hill riot.

Read the full transcript of Thorne’s message to students here.

His remarks got him swiftly put on administrative leave by the Shelby County Schools (SCS) pending a “professional misconduct” investigation.

Barton Thorne, Principal, Cordova High School
Transcript of Remarks to Cordova High School Students and Staff
January 11, 2021
The thing I want to talk about, that’s happened recently, and I never from my years of teaching
and administration, I do not get into religion and I do not get into politics with my students. It’s
not that I don’t—I’m not involved in them. I am deeply involved in them. But it’s that my belief
is those things should reflect your values, and your values is something you should get from your
parents. So, I always want to have students go to their parents when they have questions about
their values and how that value should be reflected in their faith, or in their politics, and you
want to align those decisions about religion and politics with those values and with truth. And
also, I am not a conspiracy theorist. I have no beliefs in some great overarching illuminati group
that’s taking over anything.
But some stuff happened last week that I do have some problems with, that I think affects you,
and I want to help you think about them—I’m not going to tell you what to think, I just want to
help you think. And no, it’s not about the Capitol riots, that was ignorance at the highest levels. I
don’t know too many people that are going to be okay with what happened. I don’t care what
side you agree with, we don’t practice sedition, we don’t attack our legislature. But no, it’s
what’s going on with Twitter and Facebook and Google and Apple, and their decision as private
companies to filter and to decide what you can hear and know about. And this isn’t about Trump,
I’m not getting into that, this is about speech, because there have been times even in American
history where a small group of people decided what you can hear. You think about
McCarthyanism [sic]—if you don’t know about that, you can google that, or talk to your social
studies teacher. But think about totalitarian governments: think about North Korea, think about
China, what makes those types of systems possible is the restriction and the elimination of the
free exchange of ideas. And America, and in democracies, we talk about the marketplace of
ideas. Well, what happens when the marketplace of ideas becomes a forced monopoly? What
happens when you do not have dissenting opinions, when you do not have an exchange on
competing ideas—how do you know if your ideas can stand on their own if there is no
marketplace of ideas?
Case 2:21-cv-02110 Document 1-1 Filed 02/25/21 Page 1 of 4 PageID 18
And I’m not saying that because I’m in favor of Parler, or if I’m in favor of Donald Trump, or if
I’m in favor of anybody else who is being banned, or their app is being told you cannot be in the
marketplace of ideas because you do not follow our prescribed ideas and values. I have a huge
issue with that. And to me, this became a problem back in 1990s—the 1990s, the early 1990s, in
an event that in history has become known as “Waco.” And you, most of y'all weren’t even alive,
but your teachers and your parents will know about this. I was not a part of the Branch
Davidians, I don’t have anything for or against the Branch Davidians or David Koresh, but what
happened was because there was a religious group in Waco, Texas, that some folks thought was
a little bit odd, the government decided that they needed to go in and check them out. And of
course, they were doing some things that most people would have thought was a little but outside
the norm, or maybe way outside the norm. That’s not the point. The point was that a group of
people decided that somebody who disagreed, who thought differently or looked differently from
them needed to be filtered, needed to be reined in, needed to be controlled by somebody else.
Well, that was a religious group, and I belong to a religious group. What happens if one day a
different group of people thinks that my religion is different, or funny, or should be brought into
control, or should be filtered. Take that into speech. Maybe right now I’m in the norm, maybe
right now my speech is not too outlandish, or too crazy. You might disagree, but I’m not
espousing violence, or racism, or sexism, or anything else that as a culture we deem
inappropriate. But what if a different group comes into power that no longer likes what I have to
say, or how I think, or if they begin to think that I’m extreme—at some point, any time we allow
a group of people to tell another group of people you can’t think this, you can’t say this, you
can’t write this, and you can’t go to places where it is talked about, and that’s just one step away
from now that happening to you. Because right now it may be that the ideas that you value are
shared by the people who are in power and filtering those people who are not in power. But it’s
just one election or one moment away from now that being flipped.
And I’m only getting into this because as a young person, this is your future. You have a future
ahead of you, and you will be developing your ideas and your values and the ways that you want
to express yourself. And I am not on Twitter, I’m not on Facebook, I’m not on any social media,
Case 2:21-cv-02110 Document 1-1 Filed 02/25/21 Page 2 of 4 PageID 19
my children are not on any social media—I am 100% against Twitter and Facebook and
Instagram, not because they in and of themselves are bad platforms, but what is happening on
them, I am not in favor of that. And this is, this is—predates all of these things. I got off social
media years and years ago. But because these, these entities - Twitter, Facebook, Google, and
Apple - are so powerful, and they have unilaterally made a decision of what you can and cannot
see on their platforms, that’s a major issue and I want you to understand that. I want you to
understand the problem that’s going to face you and your generation if there is no longer a
marketplace, a free exchange of ideas.
So, if Twitter and Facebook particularly want to establish themselves as a marketplace of ideas,
and if Google and Apple want to position themselves as the market where those things can be
downloaded and purchased, that then they unilaterally, outside of the elective process decide
what you can and cannot hear, that should be very chilling for you. That should be very
frightening for you, not because of the ideas that are being blocked, or being filtered, but because
there is somebody making that decision that does not have any accountability. They’re not
elected, they’re not—they’re not responsible or accountable to you, other than financially. So
sure, you can decide to take yourself off Facebook or Twitter, as I have done, but that’s it. That’s
the only accountability measure they have, and I’m not comfortable with that. And I’m not in
power, I don’t have any say, other than I want to help you guys think through it. You may be in
agreement with the people who are doing the filtering, but it’s just one moment away from
somebody else being able to filter you. And so, if they can do that to a minority—or if they can
do that to a powerful voice, it doesn’t have to be a minority—what will stop them one day from
doing that to you?
Just like Waco: I’m not a Branch Davidian, but what’s going to stop them from coming to my
church, and saying that, because we are not what they think we should be, then they have the
ability to control that and filter that. So just some things to think about, I know it’s a little bit
differently [sic] than what I normally talk about. And hopefully that helps you understand that
this is a big deal, it may not seem that way because you’re fifteen, sixteen, seventeen years old,
and you don’t have a lot of the perspective that older people have. You don’t remember Waco,
and you don’t remember Ruby Ridge, and you maybe haven’t studied or read about
Case 2:21-cv-02110 Document 1-1 Filed 02/25/21 Page 3 of 4 PageID 20
McCarthyanism [sic], and what all happened, and how many people lost their jobs, and their
lives even, because of association, or because of thoughts they may have had—or just
wonderings. Can we not just wonder anymore about things?
So, anyway, think about that. Talk to your parents about it. If you trust your teacher, talk to your
teacher about it. Be aware, be in the loop as far as what’s going on. And not whether or not you
agree or disagree with the people being filtered, but can this happen to you one day? And think
about that, and just remember that our power is in our choices. We can choose our actions, but
not our consequences. So, make wise choices, and have a great week.